FALL RIVER — A group aiming to recall Mayor Will Flanagan has just 14 more days to submit enough signatures to continue the process, but members plan to bring about 2,000 signatures to the City Clerks’s office this week for certification, according to Robert Camara, the recall group’s spokesperson.

According to a 1980 legislative act that allows for the recall of any elected Fall River official, 5 percent of the city’s 49,183 currently registered voters must sign the petition and an affidavit.

The group is required to collect 2,459 certified signatures, as well as notification that the signers are registered voters and have provided a correct address that can be certified by the Fall River Board of Elections.

“Personally, I want to try to get as many signatures as we can,” said Camara, admitting that not all signatures will pass certification.

The group was victorious in the first step of its recall effort on Aug. 12, when it successfully started the process with the submission of 12 signatures and the affidavit containing the grounds for action against Flanagan.

Elizabeth Camara, chairwoman of the city’s Board of Elections, certified that all the signatures were legal, which allowed City Clerk Alison Bouchard to issue petitions to the group.

The group cites two grounds for its recall action.

It claims Flanagan has displayed a lack of fiscal responsibility, which has resulted in tax and fee increases, created dangerous reductions in public safety and other essential services, and severely increased the financial burden on taxpayers and citizens.

The affidavit also states Flanagan failed in his fiduciary responsibility to the taxpayers and residents by leading the city into a deficit by failing to prepare for projected shortfalls. The group cites the “loss” of the $14.1 million SAFER grant, a $600,000 police grant and $1.7 million in host fees from the closing of the Fall River Indutrial Park landfill; and increases in contractual obligations Flanagan negotiated with city unions and employees.

The two-year SAFER grant expired on July 11, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency rejected another two-year funding application the city applied for.

The group claims the deficit was addressed by increases in taxes and fees and the implementation of the pay-as-you-throw program. The group states the solid waste program, which began last week, is “regressive and punitive.”

Camara also claims that members of the group who have been working around the city to collect signatures have been experiencing harassment by Flanagan supporters. One of the group's members, an elderly woman collecting signatures at the corner of Globe and South Main streets last week, was “petrified” when a man took the petitions she was holding and scribbled over signatures, Camara said, to make them indiscernible.

Camara said he met with Fall River police Chief Daniel Racine on Monday to discuss the issue and said the “integrity of the process should be protected.”

Page 2 of 2 - Racine confirmed he met with the group.

“If there are threats, we assure that if there is a threat from either side and it rises to the level of a crime, we take it very seriously,” Racine said.

Regarding the Globe Street complaint, no suspect has been identified, Racine said, and the matter is under investigation.

Camara alleged that another incident occurred at the Walmart on Monday night when a man defaced a number of petitions, though no police complaint was filed.

Flanagan said his heart goes out to any victim of crime and that he spent his career as a former assistant prosecutor advocating for victims.

“I’m disappointed the recall organization is making allegations that it is (my) supporters who are harassing their volunteers,” Flanagan said. “Something is wrong when they are quick to lay blame on me.”

Flanagan said there is no proof or correlation his supporters are involved in any alleged wrongdoing.

Flanagan has declined to talk about the specifics of the recall and has referred questions to his attorney, Preston Halperin, who did not return a call for comment.

Part of the delay in getting the signatures to Government Center on Tuesday was to work with the city clerk and Board of Elections to find out whether some of the defaced petitions could still be certified, Camara said.